Dutch priest Frans van der Lugt, who gained renown for his insistence on staying in Syria's besieged city of Homs, has been shot dead by a masked gunman.

The motive for his murder was unclear, although Syria's main opposition bloc and President Bashar Assad's regime traded blame for the killing.

Van der Lugt, 75, had become a well-known figure in the Old City of Homs, respected by many for his solidarity with residents of the rebel-held area under a government siege for nearly two years.

He refused to leave despite constant shelling and dwindling supplies, insisting Syria was his home and he wanted to be with the country's citizens in their time of need.

"I can confirm that he's been killed," Jan Stuyt, secretary of the Dutch Jesuit Order, told AFP by phone.

"A man came into his house, took him outside and shot him twice in the head. In the street in front of his house," he said, adding that the priest would be buried in Syria "according to his wishes."

'Guard wounded'

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned the shooting death Monday of a well-known Dutch priest in Syria as an "inhumane act of violence."

Ban's spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the UN chief "demands that warring parties and their supporters ensure that civilians are protected, regardless of their religion, community or ethnic affiliation."

The opposition National Council said a "masked gunman" wounded Van der Lugt's guard from the rebel Free Syrian Army when he stormed the priest's Jesuit monastery and killed him.

Van der Lugt spent nearly five decades in Syria, and told AFP in February that he considered the country to be his home.

"The Syrian people have given me so much, so much kindness, inspiration, and everything they have. If the Syrian people are suffering now, I want to share their pain and their difficulties," he said.

He stayed on even as some 1,400 people were evacuated during a UN-supervised operation that began on Feb. 7 and also saw limited supplies of food brought into the city.

Government forces have besieged Homs's Old City for nearly two years, leaving those unable to leave in increasingly dire circumstances.

"The faces of people you see in the street are weak and yellow. Their bodies are weakened and have lost their strength," Van der Lugt said before the UN operation.

"What should we do, die of hunger?"

The siege and shelling whittled away the Old City's population, including a Christian community that shrunk from tens of thousands to just 66, according to the Dutch priest.

Father Frans arrived in Syria in 1966 after spending two years in Lebanon studying Arabic.

He lived in a Jesuit monastery, where he ministered remaining Christians and tried to help poor families -- Muslims and Christians alike.

"I don't see people as Muslims or Christian, I see a human being first and foremost," he told AFP two months ago.

'Man of peace'

The Vatican praised Van der Lugt as a "man of peace," and expressed "great pain" over his death.

"This is the death of a man of peace, who showed great courage in remaining loyal to the Syrian people despite an extremely risky and difficult situation," spokesman Federico Lombardi said.

"In this moment of great pain, we also express our great pride and gratitude at having had a brother who was so close to the suffering."

"The man that's brought nothing but good in Homs, who became a Syrian among Syrians and refused to leave his people in the lurch, even when things became life-threatening, has been murdered in a cowardly manner," he said.

State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said the United States was "saddened" by the news of Van der Lugt's death and commended him for having "worked to mitigate the immense suffering in the city."

The office of Ahmad Jarba, president of the opposition National Council, condemned the murder "in the strongest terms."

It said the Assad regime was "ultimately responsible for this crime, as the only beneficiary of Father Frans's death."

Assad himself was quoted on Monday as saying the "project of political Islam has failed" in Syria, where more than 150,000 people have been killed in a three-year conflict with rebels that have come to be dominated by Islamists, ranging from moderates to radicals.

State news agency SANA said the priest's assassination was the work of "armed terrorist groups," the regime's term for rebels.

The company logo sits on the gate of the head office of PGGM, in Zeist, Netherlands, Jan. 8, 2014

(Israel) summoned the Dutch ambassador after PGGM of the Netherlands, one of the world's largest pension asset managers, divested from Israeli banks over their financing of settlements, AP reported. Israeli foreign ministry said in a statement Friday that it had asked Ambassador Caspar Veldkamp for a "clarification."

A ministry official said to Veldkamp that the decisions being made to boycott Israel are not acceptable and are based on "false claims." He said he expected the Dutch government to express an unequivocal stance against any boycotts.

"As of today, Israel is in an unstable and delicate political place than what it was in 1948," a high-ranking Israeli official told Ynet. "Netanyahu's actions are bringing upon us sanctions and boycotts."

“Netanyahu himself is also quite troubled with these issues and continues to address them. Just recently he worked fiercely to prevent the removal of Israel from the prestigious Horizon 2020 project,” according to Ynet.

On Wednesday, PGGM said it divested from five Israeli banks because they are involved in financing construction in colonial Jewish settlements.

Some 550,000 Israelis now live in settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, areas occupied by Israel from Jordan in the 1967 Mideast war, and which the Palestinian negotiators demand for a future state.

“The world seems to be losing patience with us,” Lapid told Ynet on 10 January.

In mid-December, the full membership of the American Studies Association (ASA) with its 5,000 members has voted by a two-to-one margin to endorse an academic boycott of Israel, The Electronic Intifada reported.

The vote was seen as an historic milestone in the Palestinian campaign for boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS), particularly in the United States, where university administrations have forcefully opposed student and faculty initiatives of this kind.

The Largest Dutch pension fund, PGGM, has decided to divest millions of Euros from five Israeli banks which offer financing for settlement construction.

PGGM’s decision to withdraw all its investments from the Israeli banks was based on the advisory opinion issued by the International Court of Justice in The Hague in 2004, which said that settlements in occupied Palestinian territory are illegal and violate Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention.

PGGM is the largest pension fund manager in the Netherlands, managing around 150 billion euros.

The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement is gaining momentum around the world and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called it a ”strategic threat” to Israel and its settlementpolicy.

Executive committee member Hanan Ashrawi told Ma'an
that the Dutch decision was influenced by the European Union's boycott
of Israeli settlements, which the EU views as illegal.

Ashrawi
said she was glad that civil society organizations and government
institutions in Europe had begun to take practical measures, instead of
merely releasing condemnation statements as in the past.

The
Dutch pension fund management company PGGM withdrew its funds from
Israel's five largest banks on Jan. 1, according to Israeli media.

Haaretz
reported that the company's investments in Israeli banks only amount
to "a few tens of millions of euros," but that its decision threatens
to damage the banks' image, influencing other European companies to
take similar action.

The Boycott-movement is gaining momentum around the world. This week the Israeli soccer player Dan Mori could not join his Dutch team, Vitesse, on a training camp in Abu Dhabi due to the boycott.

”Yesterday, hours before leaving, the team received a message that I would not be able to enter Dubai. The club still planned for me to fly there, hoping to use connections once we were there to make sure I was allowed to enter, but this morning they told us that I would be arrested upon entry”, says Mori, who now will have to stay in the Netherlands, training with the reserve squad.

The Dutch parlamentarian Geert Wilders, who also is an outspoken critic of Islam, criticesed the club for going to Abu Dabi without the Israeli defender.

The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions -movement (BDS) calls for an end to Israel’s occupation of Palestinian and other Arab territories occupied since 1967, including dismantling the wall and colonies; an end to Israel’s system of racial discrimination against its Palestinian citizens; and the UN-sanctioned and inherent right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes of origin.